This guitar caught me by surprise. I have never been a huge fan of Gibson guitars and never tried an ES335 for that reason. I was at my favorite local guitar shop, Woodsy’s Music playing through some Dr. Zs and saw this gorgeous red ES335 hanging on the wall. I thought to myself why on earth have I never played one of these. Joel Houston, John Mark McMillan and a bunch of other guys had been using them so I grabbed it and started playing. I was blown away by the resonance of the guitar unplugged and it the neck felt fantastic.
Plugged into both a Maz 18 and an Orange Tiny Terror the guitar was very balanced. I expected it to be kind of wonky and non flexible but it was very well balanced across the highs, mid -range and lows. It also sounded absolutely fantastic with a little bit of ambient reverb and delay. It does not do the Gretsch, chimey, Nigel Hendroff tones well and in my opinion makes a better rhythm guitar than a lead one. Through the Maz 18, it definitely had enough bite to take care of any lead tones you would want to cover however.
The finish was in great shape considering the guitar was a 1997 Dot model. The guitar was part of Woodsy’s back-line that they rent out for local shows. The guitar had actually been dropped and the neck had to be repaired. In site of the snapped neck and repair it held tune and played like it had came right off the assembly line. While I have never been a huge Gibson fan this guitar definitely swayed my opinion quite a bit and would highly recommend it to rhythm guitarists as well as worship leaders who are looking for a great rhythm guitar that can cover a lot of different ground. Lead guitarists might want the flexibility of a bigsby and some brighter pickups which could easily be added but are hard to find on a standard model.
Since I played this guitar I have played a few other ES335’s and honestly I prefer the dot. It is a no frills working man’s guitar and at $1200-$1400 used it is a great buy.
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